TRIP REPORT: San Juan Islands, WA

Wow, what a great week I've had. The day I returned from kayak fishing the Nehalem estuary, I got a call from the shop notifying me of their need for another guide to take a group of six clients on a four-day kayak camping trip in the San Juan Islands.

My gear was still soggy, and my rear end still sore from spending so much time boating the two days prior, but I jumped at the chance to head to the San Juan's.

We drove from Portland, Oregon, to Anacortes, Washington, where we hopped on the ferry to Guemes Island. After a short drive to the North point of Guemes, we met our clients, loaded gear into our kayaks, and paddled NE to Pelican Beach on the North East side of Cypress Island and established base camp.

Cypress is a beautiful island, with a circumference of about 13 nautical miles. The majesty of this place instantly clears the mind and lifts the spirits. For me, spending a few days here is like hitting the reset button on my soul. All of life's problems and annoyances seem so insignificant.
It's easy to see how this can happen, when the view from your tent looks like this:

After establishing base camp, I gathered the group for a hike to the top of the island. The views from atop the 800 ft. cliff were amazing. Looking West we could see Orcas Island & Obstruction Pass, and to the SW, the Olympic Peninsula and mountains, and to the East lie Mt. Baker and the North Cascades.

The next day the sky was overcast, but the water was glassy and the temperatures were in the mid 60's. The group opted for a "shorter" paddle, and we headed out East into the main channel between Cypress & Sinclair Is., caught the current, and whipped around the Cones on down to Pelican Point, where we had lunch before returning to base camp.

On the third day, the group was feeling more adventurous, and we decided to paddle around the North point and down the West side of Cypress to tiny Strawberry Island. Along the way we saw several seals, porpoises, and a few bald eagles. The ample sunshine made viewing marine creatures in the crystal clear water amazing. With visibility around twenty feet, we marveled at purple and orange sea stars, sun stars, urchins, anemones, herring, dungeoness and rock crab, lions mane jelly fish, and a few critters that none of us had ever seen before.

We were thankful for the mild conditions, but something told me that it wouldn't last, so we decided to give a little training to our clients. Just when everyone thought they had it easy, I decided to bail out of my boat and have one of the clients rescue me. Gary paddled over, and did a superb job pulling me back into the boat.

The final day we woke to 15 knot winds opposing a 2.5 knot current. When current and wind oppose each other, steep waves and confused seas are the result. We loaded our boats and launched into 2-3 ft waves. "Nothing this group can't handle.", I thought, but it was definitely more action than any of our clients had seen before. There was a bit of struggle keeping the boats on coarse with the tail wind and mixed wave direction, but after a few tips on surfing kayaks, everyone in the group was catching waves and giggling with joy. Our youngest and most athletic member of the group, Dustin, was really pushing his new found skill to the limit, got hit by a nice 3 foot wave from the left and a good size boat wake on the right as he paddled into a small tide race, and capsized.

As I knew these guys had not experienced much wave action before, I was ready and waiting for a capsize. The other guide on the trip, Shawn, was poised and ready for a capsize also, and being the closest to Dustin, paddled over pulled him back into the boat with no complications.

We landed in 3 foot surf, back where we started on Guemes Island after a spectacular 4 days in the islands, completely exhausted physically, but refreshed mentally. All of our clients raved about what a wonderful trip it was, and I'd have to agree. I started planning my return to the San Juans before I even got out of my boat!

I'll be back on the water, chasing king salmon in the next week or two, so stay tuned for more adventures from Kayak Angler.

-Jason